


Call of the Wild

by RosettaStarlight



Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies), Wolfwalkers (2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Shapeshifters, Animal Transformation, Dragon Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Dragonese (How to Train Your Dragon), Dragonspeak, Everyone else is the same, Feral Behavior, Feral Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Friendship, Gen, How Do I Tag, Human Toothless (How to Train Your Dragon), I Don't Even Know, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Inspired by Fanart, Inspired by Wolfwalkers, Magic, Parent Valka (How to Train Your Dragon), Platonic Relationships, Platonic Soulmates, SHapeshifting Dragons, Shapeshifting, Sort Of, but if you want to interpret some of this stuff as romance, does it count when they're shapeshifters?, hiccup and toothless are the only ones to switch roles here, i certainly won't stop you, or doing homework, romance isn't really the focus here
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:26:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27208861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosettaStarlight/pseuds/RosettaStarlight
Summary: "Created long ago by the gods to keep the balance between humans and nature, dragonwalkers walk the line of man and beast. Appearing human while awake, but at night while they dreamed, became…Dragons."=======Vikings have been on war with dragons for centuries. Years after Chief Stoick’s wife and son were lost in a dragon raid, he has become more determined than ever to rid the world of these beasts. When Toothless, a loner Viking determined to prove to his adoptive father and chief that he was a good heir and warrior, hears of rumors about people who can communicate with dragons and even turn into them, he's already written it off as nonsense. He just might be proven wrong, however, when a feral youth comes to Toothless' rescue during a raid gone wrong. After hearing his hopes and plans to bring peace between dragons and Vikings, Toothless is given a gift.A gift that leads to him discovering new things while trying to keep it a secret all at once, drawing him into the world of dragons in ways he never imagined.=======Inspired by the upcoming movie, Wolfwalkers!
Relationships: Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III & Stoick the Vast, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III & Toothless, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III & Valka
Comments: 11
Kudos: 107





	1. Prologue

_ Dragonwalkers were long deemed creatures of legend. A fairytale told to children before bed. Beings who looked just like them but could communicate and control the beasts called dragons, wild magic embedded in their very souls.  _

_ Created long ago by the gods to keep the balance between humans and nature, dragonwalkers walked the line of man and beast. Appearing human while awake, but at night while they dreamed, became… _

**Dragons** .

* * *

From the moment Hiccup was born, Valka refused to let him out of her sight for even a moment.

There was a motherly affection in her actions, but also a slightest touch of fear. No one thought much of it at first. Dragon raids happened so frequently it seemed they had to rebuild the village and restock their food every other week. Some of the greatest vikings had been lost in the battles between man and beast. Children who reached the passage of adulthood were celebrated, knowing from experience on Berk that only the strongest would survive so long.

Those that didn't, were mourned.

And her son, Hiccup, was clear from birth to be a weak, sickly thing. Small for his age, frailer as well. A miracle designed by the gods themselves that he'd survive even the first night. How a runt could come from the strong, proud Stoick the Vast was a mystery. A mystery that spouted rumors. Rumors that were quickly put to rest once the chief caught wind.

Valka's protectiveness of their son and Berk's heir was understood. Expected. Until it began to approach the line of oddity. 

She never left him alone with anyone, not for a minute. Not Gobber, despite her son's immediate attachment to the blacksmith and his own fondness for the boy, not even Stoick. If she had to do an errand or run out during a raid, Hiccup could be found strapped to her chest or back, no matter her husband's protests to leave him with him, or Gobber, or any of her friends on Berk. Excuses were made to get out of festivities or any event in which the chief and his family were required to present themselves. Whenever Stoick managed to coax his wife into attending, she was anxious, agitated and snapping when people demanded to hold or see Hiccup, and sneaking off back home if the signs of sleep began making themselves known on her son's face. 

She was afraid of something, that much became obvious. Of what, or who no one knew. 

More than once, Stoick wondered if it was  _ he _ she feared. Tradition dictated any runts were to be left out for exposure, to save the trouble of the problems the child would have as they grew older. A cruel way of saving weaklings from a world that would never treat them fairly. But the moment he caught sight of Hiccup, who was, well...a hiccup, and he survived that first night, he knew in his heart his son would grow to be  _ strong _ . Perhaps not in a way they expected, but Stoick's seen his son's a fighter.

If Valka knew that was unsaid. But she seemed determined to guard him against anything that might harm him.

The truth wasn't too far off. However, it was stranger. 

* * *

Valka hadn't grown up in Berk the same as Stoick had. It'd been so long since, and she'd adapted so well that many forgot she had once been an outsider. That she had to learn their traditions, their language, their culture, their people...and disregard her own. No one had known where she'd come from, who she'd been, in her youth. Just a girl found lost in the forest and brought into the village by the chief's son. 

Over the years she'd made the decision to stay as she grew closer to Stoick, a foolish hope in her chest that maybe from within she could start some spark of change, only to be disappointed again and again. Up until she found out she was pregnant, she had kept trying. Had to. 

She had spent so long among the humans, she wasn't sure if her own people would take her back even if she could find and return to them. But she still had this. Her home, her family. And she had to keep trying to get to the bottom of this bloodshed and stop it. To open people's minds to change.

There was only so much, she could do, though, since her magic had long since gone. 

Dragons were her kin just as much as humans were. She couldn't turn her back on them. Despite her efforts to keep a foot in both worlds just as she had once in her youth, the longer time went on, the more she could see she'd have to choose someday whose side she was on.

And a feeling in her gut told her that was coming soon.

And so until she was sure her son had or hadn't inherited her magic, she'd just have to keep a close eye on him. It could wake up in him at any time, but with Stoick's blood in his veins, he might grow up to be just another normal human boy. Once she knew, she could think on how to cross that bridge, but for now, no one could watch Hiccup sleep. Not even Stoick. 

She's lost track of the amount of times she'd stayed up in the past few months since he'd been born, watching him sleep for hours before allowing herself to rest. What would her husband think if her son was like her? If he found out what she once was, what she still was deep down in her core, though she could no longer change. Would he cast him out? Kill him?

No matter how hard she tried to shake those thoughts from her mind, they remained. Stoick loved Hiccup, had such faith in him. She remembered what he told her when Hiccup managed to survive his own birth.

_ "Our boy's going to become the strongest of them all." _

And she knew he wasn't just saying it to reassure her. He truly believed it.

But she'd also seen the way he'd treated dragons. Trapped them, killed them, forced them into the kill ring. The kill ring where they might as well be torturing the poor beasts, setting them loose only to teach their young to fight before forcing them back into their prisons. Or for their new generation of dragon killers to prove themselves as "proper vikings."

Stoick was a man set in his ways, and she'd fallen in love with him despite herself and all she was, but she feared him, too, and what he'd do if he knew. What the people of Berk would do, if they knew.

Dread filled the pit of her stomach when one night, just as she began to believe the boy was like his father after all, a soft crash reached her ears from where she'd placed Hiccup to sleep hours before. Giving her husband a quick reassurance, she ran out the room to find Hiccup sound asleep in his cradle, quiet. Sleeping quieter than he had in ages. And looking down at the floor, she knew why.

Quickly shutting the door, she turned back to the vision in front of her now. A hatchling smaller and developed slower than those his age, scales black as night and not yet fireproof, little nubs around his face, padded along the floor, looking disoriented and stumbling over his new limbs and senses. Valka couldn't help the soft laughter that left her lips.

At the sound, the dragon hatchling looked directly at her, big green eyes the same shade as her son's, pupils dilated. He gave a soft trill and started toward her, stumbling and falling down more than once as he crawled to her despite being a few months from doing so. At least while awake. 

Valka kneeled down, beckoning him to her. Little face scrunched in concentration, the little dragon finally managed to waddle over to her, plopping his head on her lap, looking rather proud of his accomplishment. 

"Yeah… It takes a bit of getting used to," Valka whispered. "Hiccup." The hatchling cooed and looked up at her again with wide green eyes.

The rules of their magic, of Valka's tribe before she'd gotten separated and lost from them, echoed in her mind.

_ Dragon when asleep. _

_ Human when awake. _

If she were with them, if she were in a world where she needn't worry, she'd have been proud. One's first shifting had always called for celebrating, but now fear tainted the moment. Hiccup began crawling to the door, likely wanting to show his father his new trick, but Valka quickly grabbed him much to the other's indignant screech. She shushed him, gathering him into her arms, muttering soft words to him he likely didn't yet understand, but her tone and voice placated him as he snuggled closer to her. 

They spent the rest of the night like that, Valka wondering what now to do.

* * *

On any other night, Valka would never say she was _ thankful _ for a raid. 

But she couldn't deny it gave a good distraction. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel kind of bad for taking so long to update, but I'm close to graduating high school so my dad's been getting on me about taking my classes seriously and getting my work done. And I also hit a TEENY weeny writer's block, for a bit halfway through, but, eh, I got it back on track, so here it is! I intentionally made it kind of vague near the end to give me some idea of what to write next to tell what exactly happened. Anyway, hope you guys like it!

A man should never have to witness his wife and child taken from him too soon, gone in claws and flame. 

But no one ever said the gods were kind. 

Stoick’s tribe had paid in blood before, battling the damned beasts that plagued their home, and he was not the first man to pay in lives and family. His own flames of hatred grew in his heart after dragons killed his wife and baby boy, fanned by each new one downed and captured. 

Their faces are all he can see some nights as he nursed his wounds, a woman he’d loved and lost and a baby who he’d never see grow and whose face had begun to blur over time. 

At first, some faint childish part of him he thought had long died hoped. But when remains failed to wash ashore or fall from the skies, when no footprints or paths marked themselves in the woods, when his prayers went unanswered and unheeded, he knew they were gone forever.

Stoick could only pray their deaths had been quick.

In the years that passed, it never once returned. The dragon that seized her in its claws and carried her off far out of Stoick’s reaches. The beast that ate his only son.

It had been five years.

Five years after their disappearance, he found the boy. A boy who had come from the sea. A tattered ship already half sunk. Each of its three sails torn apart and what was left of the wood scorched.

And below the mighty cliffs, someone washed along Berkian shores, drifting in the cold sea. A shivering child who managed to endure so long in the frigid waters it could have only been the Norns’ design that he should live. 

And it had to only be of the Norns’ design Stoick had seen him as the sun began to peek over the horizon to cautiously take its place in the sky. Odin knows what might have become of him if help had come any later.

Some faint part of him couldn’t help but hope at the sight of a boy who couldn’t seem to be much older than his son would be should he still be alive. That last shred of hope, however, died when he caught full sight of him. 

Lying unconscious and covered in sand and the rising tide, clothing torn and scorched, recent burns and cuts all over his face to his arms and legs, was a boy who could not possibly be from anywhere near Berk. Hair black as night and dark skin with freckles specked around his cheeks...it wasn’t his son. But it was still a  _ child  _ who, from the looks of it, had barely survived those merciless winged beasts.

A helpless...child...like his son had been. Who hadn’t even a chance against such monsters...

The thought ran short as the boy continued to shiver. Stoick shifted him to place an ear on his small chest, hearing his heart fight to keep beating. Weak, but still there. Not for much longer if he didn’t get him to the healer.

The chief was quick to pull him out of the freezing water before taking off his furs to wrap it around his shivering form to keep him warm. He hoisted him up in his arms, where he then headed back to the village as quickly and carefully as possible to Gothi.

Though she had not taken well to being woken in the early hours of the dawn, once she noticed the small, unfamiliar face swaddled in furs and the urgent tone of her chief’s voice, she ushered them inside.

Stoick couldn’t understand Gothi without Gobber, who was the only one in the village with the ability to even come close to comprehending the scrabbles she wrote in the dirt, but he knew when to stay out of the old woman’s way. An hour later, having replaced the furs with a dry blanket, cleaned and wrapped the boy’s wounds, and spooned him a tea made of an assortment of herbs and leaves, though still weak, it seemed the child had relaxed into a deep sleep. All that could be done now was wait for him to wake up. And hope he will at all.

Stoick soon found himself still sitting by the bedside long after the midday sun began to shine on the hills and trees of the island. 

A boy now lost a family and home. A widower who five years ago this day lost a wife and son. Perhaps the gods had taken pity and sent him a second chance. A boy who needed someone to look after him. 

Perhaps it was merely Stoick’s own want for a reason for this sudden attachment to a child not even belonging to his own people. But he was still there when the boy finally opened eyes green as the forest to a strange, unfamiliar world.

* * *

Stoick was going to kill that boy.

All around him was chaos. He used the weight of the giant hammer in hand to clobber the nearest Zippleback head, the dragon screaming at him but then pulled back, taking off into the sky.

"Where is he?" Stoick growled. The last he'd seen him was when the dragons first showed up in the sky, and he gave very  _ specific _ orders to stay out of the line of fire.

Unfortunately, Toothless was never good at following those. There were a lot of things he wasn’t that became an increasing migraine for the chief over the years.

Never around when he wasn’t needed, Hel, he was hardly even around when he  _ was _ needed. It was damn near impossible to find him again after he left the house, and even more so to predict where he might be this time. Could be with the sarcastic old smith, in the arena, the great hall, anywhere in the village (when he was eleven, Stoick would spend three hours searching for him only to find him curled up and dozing off on the roof of someone’s house, or even a tree--now, in searching, he found it important to look  _ up,  _ too), or maybe nowhere in the village and instead exploring the forest. And once there, he could only imagine where he was in the maze of foliage.

Which was exactly why when the raid started, he made sure to look Toothless directly in the eye and spoke as slowly and carefully as possible to tell him he was to stay  _ right there  _ where he left him. Without breaking eye contact, Toothless gave an exaggeratingly slow nod. 

And then in exactly the ten seconds it took for Stoick to turn around, bark an order to get the fire under control, and then turn back, he’d disappeared. 

“Oh, relax, Stoick. I’m sure he’s doing just fine--” 

Gobber’s words were cut off when a sharp whistle shrieked through the air followed by a dragon’s screech. And a  _ crash!  _ as it fell to the earth.

Within minutes, Vikings were upon the downed Deadly Nadder, weapons at the ready.

Stoick glowered at him. “You were saying?”

“Eh, at least he’s helping out, right?” the blacksmith shrugged. “Would you rather he not?”

Stoick supposed he should be grateful Toothless was one of the few reasons it'd become easier to keep dragons out of the underground cavern carved out to shelter the herds and their food stocks. He’d never slacked in pulling his own weight around the village. He disappeared often enough, but that didn’t mean he did nothing everyday. Silent, invisible, sharp green eyes that seemed a bit too big for his face but never failed to miss anything, that was just how he was. But he was smart, too, and helped out when he could, even if he was gone right after.

He just hated never knowing where Toothless was. It felt like those last moments all over again; seeing Valka run off after urging her to go to the shelter, having no idea if she got there or was intercepted, hoping she was safe, and then hearing her scream.

Another shrieking arrow shooting through the air, aimed by an unseen assailant. Another dragon down. And another.

Then another inhuman scream. High above the village, an alien, discordant sound echoed, like no other dragon he’s heard before. Stoick stared up at the night sky, trying to spot it, but found nothing. 

Wait, there! A faint outline camouflaged against the night as it flew. The telltale whistle of one of Toothless’ arrows. Aimed for the wings, like he was taught--

As he squinted, he realized the dragon was black as night, and from the looks of it, like nothing he’d ever seen-- oh, Hel.

The shadow demon, that was his best guess, a Night Fury, never seen by anyone on Berk, almost thought a myth, possibly here and now and angry for being shot at.

The dragon’s shriek burst out in a blast of fire, aimed not at the village, but in the direction of the woods. An explosion erupted, all but reducing the trees into flames. And among the chaos and confusion, shouting and running as the dragons started to take off with whatever they’d managed to grab, Stoick froze.

Part of him wanted to stand there and stare, gaping. Another part of him wants to grab Gobber by his shirt and shake him and immediately order out a search party. Another wants to deny what he thought he just saw. Believe Toothless had been somewhere else. That the dragon had aimed wrong, and the boy was just fine, that when he came back to the village, Stoick would scold him until his ears rang.

However, he is still a chief whose people were still recovering from yet another attack and whose village was still in shambles. 

The village comes first. The words came automatically from years of this routine over and over.

“Get the fire squad on those houses,” he barked, because the fire’s still rising. “Get the wounded to Gothi, check on the food supplies, prepare burials for the dead, and Spitelout, get those downed beasts to the arena!” 

“Astrid!” 

She parted from the group set on extinguishing the fires and looked questioningly at him, but Stoick only beckoned her forward. “You,” he said solemnly, “you’re one of the best trackers on Berk. You saw what happened?”

She nodded. Frankly, she’d be surprised if no one had. She was just glad the village hadn’t been on the other side of that blast. 

“Toothless is somewhere on this island. Find him. Take whoever you like, if you wish, but I want him back here.”  _ Dead or alive _ , he didn’t say aloud. He needed to know for sure this time. 

He couldn’t do it again, not knowing.

Astrid seemed unusually unsure of this request. She knew just as well as him the chances of anyone surviving  _ that _ were slim. “Got it, Chief,” she said as he walked away to lead his tribe. “Um, chief?” 

“Yes?”

“What if he--”

“Dead or alive, bring him to me. If he is alive, take him home, if he’s dead, bring him here so I can bury him and take that beast’s head.”

**Author's Note:**

> The ending was originally supposed to be deleted from the first draft, but then I thought on it, and realized, "Wait, that could work!" 
> 
> Anyway, I haven't seen the movie yet although there are people who have, and from the trailer alone, I am most certainly hooked, but the premise and concept had me immediately thinking of this, soooo. Plus, it's a way of combining some of my favorite au's in this fandom into one! I'm not gonna lie, this is gonna be mostly based off lore I've seen in the trailer and theories of the lore I have and seen. The rest is just gonna be made up as I go. Hiccup and Toothless are going to be the only ones whose roles are reversed in this. I had several ideas on how I wanted this to go, and having it the other way around did cross my mind, but then I thought to make the "heart of a chief, soul of a dragon" thing literal. Plus, the angst potential of Stoick losing his family, and never really getting it back even after they return is just too tempting. I then had the idea of having Astrid discover and become a Wolfwalker and having Toothless and Hiccup together from the beginning, but I love their dynamic in the movies and how we see it form too much to do that either. SO... here we are.
> 
> Also, romance won't really be a focus here. Maybe in the background between some people might be implied, but everything else is just kinda up for interpretation. Most of the relationships in this will remain platonic, but if you WANT to see it as romantic, it could be seen that way and I won't stop you. 
> 
> Anyway, updates won't be that insured since I started senior year last month and my teachers are trying to drown me in projects and homework, but I'll try to working on this! Hope you like this and keep safe!


End file.
